Taste and See

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I’ll never forget the first time I saw Lake Superior. After setting up camp in Muskallonge Lake State Park in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, we and our kids walked across the street from the campground and then followed a trail that led to Lake Superior. When we emerged from the lush trail and stepped onto the beach, the sight of this gorgeous Great Lake took my breath away. As I gazed at the expanse of beautiful blue water and multi-colored stones covering the beach and extending into the clear lake, the song “How Great Thou Art” welled up inside me. I remember feeling convinced that anyone who’s an atheist has never stood on the shores of Lake Superior.

We don’t have to travel hundreds of miles to experience the wonders of God’s love. Sometimes all it takes is a conscientious effort to look for the amazing blessings that He’s showering upon us right here. Sometimes, we just have to see what’s already in front of us. 

For example, this time of year we can look beyond the corn in the field and the tomatoes in the garden and see God’s loving hand behind them. We can use our imagination to picture Him dreaming up and designing all the different vegetables to feed our bodies with His loving, joyful creativity. Also, we can see our family and friends as gifts from Him to feed our souls and look at them with renewed gratitude. Sometimes we just have to look around with fresh eyes and try to begin to grasp how great God is. 

When we seek God – when we look for expressions of His unconditional love – we move closer to Him. When we acknowledge how He provides for us, we begin to trust Him more. Sometimes, when we look for Him in the beauty of nature and the people we care about, we may experience His presence – not on an intellectual level but sensing with our heart that He’s with us. Sometimes, when we seek Him, we may get just a taste of the magnificence of His goodness. All of this brings us deep joy, as I experienced on the beach of Lake Superior that summer day. And so we keep seeking, drawing nearer to Him, trusting Him, and opening our hearts for a greater understanding and experience of His love.   

God’s goodness is all around us. Let’s seek Him; let’s look for the many blessings He’s gifted to us – in the wonders of nature and the people we love. Let’s let a song of praise rise up to Him from the depths of our hearts for the immeasurable love He has for us.

“Taste and see the goodness of the Lord.” – Psalm 34:8  

Let everything I do be with You, for You, and because of You.

Thank you for reading my reflection.  All thanks to God for giving me the ideas and guiding my words!    © 2025 Gina Bedell   

  

Through these reflections, I invite you, the reader, to reflect on a given topic and then seek deeper answers through prayer, additional spiritual reading, and/or consultation with clergy or other qualified persons in order to grow in your faith and understanding of God’s love and will for your life. 

Please share this with your friends by clicking on one of the icons below.  Comments are always welcome! 

If you or someone you know would like to receive these writings directly, please email me at ginabedell1@gmail.com and I will add you to my ‘BCC’ email list. 

You can also find my posts on my Facebook page!

P.S.

Pray for peace at home and around the world. Donate to a cause that tugs at your heart. Take care of those around you; take care of our planet. Pray for the people around the globe whose lives have been torn apart by war and natural disasters.

A New Creation

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They say that change is constant. 

A caterpillar being transformed into a butterfly is the epitome of change. It’s good to keep in mind, though, that this change doesn’t come easily and it doesn’t happen overnight. The caterpillar eats voraciously, and nearly continuously, to grow strong. After she builds her chrysalis and is transformed into a butterfly inside it, she has to work to emerge from it. Her struggle to break through the hard shell is necessary for her to develop strong, healthy wings. Some people have tried to ‘help’ butterflies emerge, but this actually harms them: The caterpillar’s and butterfly’s respective work is what lets her reach her ultimate goal. In all stages of the butterfly’s development, there’s no stagnation. There’s constant work and constant change. 

The same is true for us in our spiritual life. We’ll become stronger in our faith when we resist stagnation – when we work at our spiritual growth and ask God to work with us. We’ll grow stronger in our faith by learning, through prayer and experience, how God wants us to express that faith. We’ll discover how we can show our love for God and for our neighbor with our personalities and talents and all the other resources He’s given us. What God asks of us may very well change with the seasons of our life. As we mature and as our faith grows stronger, we’ll learn to follow God’s promptings and change as He guides us to. And over time, we’ll be transformed – we’ll live with and for Christ more and more. We’ll become kinder, wiser, more patient, more generous, more compassionate, more charitable, more forgiving, more loving, and more prayerful. We’ll become more and more focused on God and less on ourselves. We’ll become more like Him.

To let our Lord accomplish all of this in us, we have to be open to change; we have to allow ourselves to be changed by the One Who created us. To become more like God, we have to become a new creation – we have to become the people He created us to be.

This doesn’t happen overnight, and it doesn’t happen without effort on our part. So, let’s ask our Lord for the grace to open our hearts to Him, and to help us see how He wants us to change. Let’s ask Him to help us identify and abandon our old, stagnant ways. Let’s ask Him to draw us closer to Himself and to help us take advantage of opportunities to spend more time with Him during our day. Let’s ask Him to show us how we might find new ways to show His love to the people in our family and in our community. 

Let’s ask God for the courage to let Him transform us into the people He created us to be.

“So whoever is in Christ is a new creation...” – 2 Corinthians 5:17

Let everything I do be with You, for You, and because of You.

Thank you for reading my reflection.  All thanks to God for giving me the ideas and guiding my words!    © 2025 Gina Bedell   

  

Through these reflections, I invite you, the reader, to reflect on a given topic and then seek deeper answers through prayer, additional spiritual reading, and/or consultation with clergy or other qualified persons in order to grow in your faith and understanding of God’s love and will for your life. 

Please share this with your friends by clicking on one of the icons below.  Comments are always welcome! 

If you or someone you know would like to receive these writings directly, please email me at ginabedell1@gmail.com and I will add you to my ‘BCC’ email list. 

You can also find my posts on my Facebook page!

P.S.

Pray for peace at home and around the world. Donate to a cause that tugs at your heart. Take care of those around you; take care of our planet. Pray for the people around the globe whose lives have been torn apart by war and natural disasters.

"I Am With You"

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During recess, adults who serve as playground monitors tend to stay in the background. They don’t interact with the kids much but are ready if a child needs help. Sometimes, especially if a big kid is chasing him, a small child will run over and stand next to one of these adults. He knows she’ll protect him as long as he’s standing close to her. The playground monitors are always present but, until they need help, the kids don’t pay much attention to them.

We can take this image and expand it, and apply it to God. Though we’ve heard it many times, we sometimes need to remind ourselves that God is always with us; there’s never a time when He’s not with us. Unlike the adults on the playground, though, our Lord isn’t a distant bystander. He’s not watching us with indifference until we need a favor from Him. Rather, He’s watching with a loving, burning desire for us to acknowledge His presence and ‘stand close to Him.’ He wants us to come to Him many times throughout our day to share with Him not only our fears and concerns but also our joys, as we do with a dear friend. He wants us to include Him even in the ordinary happenings of our lives. He wants us to see every moment as an opportunity to stand close to Him.  

What does this look like?

In the morning, we thank Him for His loving presence and ask Him to show us what He wants us to do as we go about our day. We’re mindful of Him as we work, whether at home or outside the home. Being mindful of His presence with us, we look for ways to go out of our way to be kind and compassionate – to show Him to the people around us. Before we make a phone call or join a meeting, we ask Him to guide our words and help us listen with an open heart. When someone does or says something to us that’s kind or helpful, we thank God for that person. Even while we’re driving or doing a mundane chore like folding laundry or mowing the lawn, we talk to Him honestly about whatever is on our mind. Talking with Him about it draws our hearts closer to His. When we do these things, over time we’ll get to know better, first-hand, His deep Love for us; we’ll want to align our will with His, and we’ll find joy and peace in doing so.

Let’s remember that God is always with us, not as an indifferent bystander but as our loving companion, friend, and confidant. Let’s do our part to look for Him and stand close to Him, not just in times of trouble but in every moment of our day.

“Know that I am with you… I will never leave you.” – Genesis 28:15

Let everything I do be with You, for You, and because of You.

Thank you for reading my reflection.  All thanks to God for giving me the ideas and guiding my words!    © 2025 Gina Bedell   

  

Through these reflections, I invite you, the reader, to reflect on a given topic and then seek deeper answers through prayer, additional spiritual reading, and/or consultation with clergy or other qualified persons in order to grow in your faith and understanding of God’s love and will for your life. 

Please share this with your friends by clicking on one of the icons below.  Comments are always welcome! 

If you or someone you know would like to receive these writings directly, please email me at ginabedell1@gmail.com and I will add you to my ‘BCC’ email list. 

You can also find my posts on my Facebook page!

P.S.

Pray for peace at home and around the world. Donate to a cause that tugs at your heart. Take care of those around you; take care of our planet. Pray for the people around the globe whose lives have been torn apart by war and natural disasters.

Dare to Believe

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When Jesus appears to the apostles after His resurrection, Thomas isn’t with them. Thomas refuses to believe that they’ve seen Jesus alive and even insists, “Until I see the mark of the nails in His hands and put my finger into the nail marks and put my hand into His side, I will not believe.” The following week Jesus shows Thomas His wounds and Thomas exclaims, “My Lord and my God!” Then Jesus says, “Have you come to believe because you have seen Me? Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.”

First, we might ask, “Why wasn’t Thomas with them?” Maybe he was afraid of what would happen to him if he was with the others and their hiding place was discovered. Maybe he wanted to grieve alone. We don’t know. What we do know is that the rest of the apostles stayed together; they understood that they needed each other. By distancing himself from them, Thomas not only missed out on their support but, even worse, he missed out on seeing Jesus alive at that time.

The apostles knew, as we know, that community is important. When we distance ourselves from others or don’t feel part of a community, we miss out on the support that a community can provide. We also miss out on seeing how the power of God’s Love, which is infinitely stronger than human love, can work wonders when we open our hearts to Him.

Also, when Christ said, ‘Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed’ He was talking about you and me. We’d like to think we would have believed the apostles. So this might be a good time to ask ourselves, ‘Do I really believe that the Lord is alive, and lives in me, today? Do I believe that His Love for me is more profound, and therefore more powerful, than any human love I could ever experience? Do I have the courage to invite this Love to permeate my soul; direct all I think, say, and do; and transform me and help me to become the person He created me to be?’ 

We don’t see Jesus walking around now. It takes courage to believe that He’s alive, that He’s alive in us, and that He wants to take over our hearts. It takes courage because belief demands a response. When we dare to believe He’s present with us, right now, and we dare to open our hearts to Him, we dare to let ourselves be transformed by His Love.

Let’s ask our Lord to give us the courage to believe, deep in our hearts, that He’s alive – and act on that belief. 

“Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.” – John 20:29

Let all I do be with You, for You, and because of You.

Thank you for reading my reflection.  All thanks to God for giving me the ideas and guiding my words!    © 2025 Gina Bedell   

  

Through these reflections, I invite you, the reader, to reflect on a given topic and then seek deeper answers through prayer, additional spiritual reading, and/or consultation with clergy or other qualified persons in order to grow in your faith and understanding of God’s love and will for your life. 

Please share this with your friends by clicking on one of the icons below.  Comments are always welcome! 

If you or someone you know would like to receive these writings directly, please email me at ginabedell1@gmail.com and I will add you to my ‘BCC’ email list. 

You can also find my posts on my Facebook page!

P.S.

Pray for peace at home and around the world. Donate to a cause that tugs at your heart. Take care of those around you; take care of our planet. Pray for the people around the globe whose lives have been torn apart by war and natural disasters.

Let Your Light Shine

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If we read the lives of the saints, we may be inspired by their great works and heroic bravery. We may also think there must have been something superhuman about them that let them live such holy lives or make such a dramatic difference in the world. In reality, most of the saints were ordinary people like us who did extraordinary things simply by letting God’s light shine in and through them. And while most of us won’t be asked to do something remarkable like caring for people who are sick and dying in the streets as St. Teresa of Calcutta did, all of us are called, with our own skills, to have a holy and positive impact on the world around us. How can we do this?

We can do this with God, Who lives in us. No matter what job or role we hold, all of us who’ve been baptized already have the power of God within us to do good works and change the world around us for the better, in small or big ways. 

God is always with us. When we become aware of His presence and let His light shine in us, we let Him affect all of our thoughts, words, and actions. As our faith strengthens and our awareness of His presence grows, we let the power of His love overtake our hearts. The more we do this, the more we act less from our own strength and inspiration and more from His power. With Him, we know that we can be and do more good than we could ever do on our own. Even as we work to overcome our human weaknesses and failings, we strive not to do what is our will but God’s will. For example, with God we can love those we find difficult; be patient and calm in times of stress; be peaceful, and peacemakers, in our chaotic world. Knowing that He’s present with us, loving us, and guiding us gives us His peace, which no one can take away from us. And His peace brings us deep joy.

When we let God use us to be beacons of light to the people around us, we really can have a holy and positive impact on our world. And when others see God working through us then they, too, will want the peace and joy that we have. They, too, will thank God for His loving power.         

So our kindness toward others, our loving actions, and our peaceful, joyful demeanor all happen when His light shines in us. For that and all that comes from Him, we give thanks and glory to God.

“You are the light of the world…. Let your light shine before others so that they may see your good deeds and glorify your heavenly Father.” – Matthew 5:14, 16  

Let all I do be with You, for You, and because of You.

Thank you for reading my reflection.  All thanks to God for giving me the ideas and guiding my words!    © 2025 Gina Bedell   

  

Through these reflections, I invite you, the reader, to reflect on a given topic and then seek deeper answers through prayer, additional spiritual reading, and/or consultation with clergy or other qualified persons in order to grow in your faith and understanding of God’s love and will for your life. 

Please share this with your friends by clicking on one of the icons below.  Comments are always welcome! 

If you or someone you know would like to receive these writings directly, please email me at ginabedell1@gmail.com and I will add you to my ‘BCC’ email list. 

You can also find my posts on my Facebook page!

P.S.

Pray for peace at home and around the world. Donate to a cause that tugs at your heart. Take care of those around you; take care of our planet. Pray for the people around the globe whose lives have been torn apart by war and natural disasters.

The Advocate Is With You

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When was the last time you did something for the first time? When was the last time you did something that made you nervous or scared? Those common questions challenge us to take a look at how willing we are to go out of our comfort zones to grow physically, mentally, emotionally, or spiritually.

When was the last time you asked God for a gift? Not just a favor, or the answer to a prayer, but for one of His gifts: Wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, or fear of the Lord? What about the gifts of His love, patience, peace, joy, honesty, humility, and all the other good things He wants and is eager to give you? 

When we ask Him for these things, we acknowledge that something is lacking in us. That takes honesty and humility. It takes courage to ask, too, because we know that these gifts will help us grow stronger in our faith. With stronger faith, we may be bolder in sharing His love in more concrete and perhaps even profound ways with the people around us. This might stretch us out of our comfort zone; we may feel anxious at the thought of living our faith ‘out loud.’

But we can ask God for these things with confidence. He has already given us His Spirit – His Spirit – through our baptism. He is eager to give us more and more of His gifts and has promised to stay with us as we work to put them into practice. We just have to ask Him and then trust Him to guide us and strengthen us. With the blessing of His gifts and the power of His Spirit, we can be and do more with Him and for Him. 

In these days before Pentecost, let’s ask our Lord to fill us with His gifts. Let’s open our hearts to receive more of His goodness from Him. Let’s courageously go out of our comfort zones and allow Him to use us to show the power of His love in more concrete and profound ways to the people around us.

Let’s ask Him:

Lord, fill me.

Fill me, change me, energize me with the gifts of Your Spirit.

Fill me with Your love so that I can share You with the people in my world.

Fill me with Your Spirit so that no other spirit hinders me.

Fill me with Your peace so that I can bring peace to others.

Fill me, love me, empower me with Your Spirit.

“I will ask the Father and he will give you another Advocate to be with you always.”

– John 14:16 

Let all I do be with You, for You, and because of You.

Thank you for reading my reflection.  All thanks to God for giving me the ideas and guiding my words!    © 2025 Gina Bedell   

  

Through these reflections, I invite you, the reader, to reflect on a given topic and then seek deeper answers through prayer, additional spiritual reading, and/or consultation with clergy or other qualified persons in order to grow in your faith and understanding of God’s love and will for your life. 

Please share this with your friends by clicking on one of the icons below.  Comments are always welcome! 

If you or someone you know would like to receive these writings directly, please email me at ginabedell1@gmail.com and I will add you to my ‘BCC’ email list. 

You can also find my posts on my Facebook page!

P.S.

Pray for peace at home and around the world. Donate to a cause that tugs at your heart. Take care of those around you; take care of our planet. Pray for the people around the globe whose lives have been torn apart by war and natural disasters.

They Sang in Prison

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In the Acts of the Apostles, we read how the apostles went from city to city teaching people about the risen Christ. Usually, the people listened to the apostles and welcomed their message. But on one particular occasion, Paul and Silas were met with hostility; they were beaten and then thrown into prison. Picturing them sitting in a cell with their feet chained to a stake, we might expect that they panicked. We could relate to them if they agonized about what else could possibly go wrong. We could even understand if they ranted at God and questioned how He could allow them to be arrested while they did His work. 

But that’s not what they did. As Paul and Silas sat in their cell, they prayed out loud and sang hymns to God while the other prisoners listened. They were such a non-threat to the jailer that he fell asleep at his post. 

Paul and Silas may have first felt panic, worry, anger, and the other difficult emotions we naturally feel when we find ourselves in a painful situation; we don’t know. But we can follow their example and make a decision to turn our hearts and thoughts to our Lord when the going gets tough and ask Him to help us get through it.

It’s a choice we can make. When we’re in a crisis, we can either let ourselves get into a tizzy – and stay there – or we can pray and praise God even with those difficult emotions. We can use our praying or singing to ask God to help us carry our pain. We can continue to praise Him for His goodness and His love for us, confident that He’ll support us through every struggle. 

This may be difficult to do. We so easily get dragged down into despair! However, if we make it a habit to pray and praise God when things are going relatively smoothly, then it will be more natural for us to do so when life overwhelms us. That’s one reason why Paul writes, “Pray without ceasing. In all circumstances give thanks…” (1 Thessalonians 5:17-18).

Praying and praising God might not take away our struggle, but doing so will help us focus less on the problem and more on the loving compassion of God. We’ll remind ourselves that He will never abandon us, and that reassurance may help ease our burden. We might ask Him, “Now what do I do?” We can listen for direction from Him, spoken either through the people around us or in the thoughts and feelings that come to us. Maybe there will be something we can do to remedy the situation, and maybe not. Either way, we can trust our Lord to lead us through every challenge. We just have to ask Him. 

“About midnight, while Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God as the prisoners listened…” – Acts 16:25

Let all I do be with You, for You, and because of You.

Thank you for reading my reflection.  All thanks to God for giving me the ideas and guiding my words!    © 2025 Gina Bedell   

  

Through these reflections, I invite you, the reader, to reflect on a given topic and then seek deeper answers through prayer, additional spiritual reading, and/or consultation with clergy or other qualified persons in order to grow in your faith and understanding of God’s love and will for your life. 

Please share this with your friends by clicking on one of the icons below.  Comments are always welcome! 

If you or someone you know would like to receive these writings directly, please email me at ginabedell1@gmail.com and I will add you to my ‘BCC’ email list. 

You can also find my posts on my Facebook page!

P.S.

Pray for peace at home and around the world. Donate to a cause that tugs at your heart. Take care of those around you; take care of our planet. Pray for the people around the globe whose lives have been torn apart by war and natural disasters.